


Through the Fire

by hungrybookworm



Category: Touhou Project
Genre: Gen, Prequel, Underground, darkish
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-01-04
Updated: 2015-01-04
Packaged: 2018-03-05 03:17:47
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,056
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3103556
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hungrybookworm/pseuds/hungrybookworm
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Temperatures rise in The Palace of the Earth Spirits, and Rin investigates the cause. A Subterranean Animism prequel.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Through the Fire

**Author's Note:**

> Touhou Project (c) ZUN/Team Shanghai Alice
> 
> Based on the request "Rin/Utsuho - Through the Fire (89)" from tumblr user rabbiteclair. (I got lazy with the title, shhh...)

The heat gave everything away. Rin woke up from her catnap to find the palace’s chequered tiles burning hot. She leapt up in the air with shock, and scooted over to a nearby chair before her paws blistered. Blinding white light poured up from the stained glass windows set in the floor, and projected a kaleidoscope of colours onto the ceiling.

The air was thick and humid, and hard to breathe. Rin closed her eyes and let herself morph into her human form. Much better. She immediately felt cooler without fur, and she took a deep breath, making full use of her greater lung capacity. Her palms and soles throbbed, but at least her feet were covered with shoes. She could walk across the corridor now.

“Orin? Where are you?”

Satori spoke to her left. She was shielding her eyes with one hand. Rin noticed a heat haze at the far end of the corridor.

“I’m here, Satori-sama.” Rin slipped off the chair, and stepped onto the floor. 

Satori looked at her, frowning slightly. “So you don’t know anything about this either.” She sighed after a moment, disappointed. Rin rarely had to say anything back, thanks to her mistress’ mind-reading ability. It made things convenient. “Can you talk to the other pets and see if they know where all this heat is coming from?”

“Of course.”

“Thank you.” Satori walked past her. “I’ll be in the bath, if you need me.”

“Okay.”

“You’re welcome to join me after you’ve talked to the others.”

“Thank you, Satori-sama.”

Once Satori was out of sight, Rin began her search for the other pets. She wandered down the corridor, looking through every room and cupboard she passed. There were hundreds of animals living in the palace, but today none of them seemed to be around. They were probably sheltering somewhere cooler, like in the ice house or near the roof. But before Rin could turn around and head for the nearest flight of stairs, a stray thought drifted through her mind.

Wasn’t Utsuho in charge of the Hell of Blazing Fires? The Palace of the Earth Spirits was built over it. If the heat was radiating from the floor, then wouldn’t that mean it was coming from there? Rin had been friends with Utsuho for a long time. She wasn’t exactly the brightest bird, even among hell ravens, but she always did her job.

Had something happened to her?

Rin wiped the sweat off her brow. It was probably just something stupid, like Utsuho tossing in too many corpses at once. But the palace hadn’t been this hot since they were cut off from Hell. Rin needed to see what’d happened for herself, before any of the other pets did. She stepped out into the corridor, and walked towards the courtyard.

It wasn’t much cooler outside. She could feel the heat radiating out of the ground. Her wheelbarrow sat near the back door, and Rin reached for it out of habit. But she stopped herself just in time. The metal would burn her, and it’d just get in the way. There was no point bringing it. Instead she walked over to the hole in the centre of the courtyard, and floated down through it. Seconds later, Rin covered her eyes with her arms.

The Hell of Blazing Fires was in operation.

The bright white light was scorching hot. Molten lava floated below her, robbing the air of oxygen. Her eyes hurt, and she felt her clothes grow heavy with sweat. She had to make it quick. Rin floated as close to the ceiling as she could, occasionally knocking into stalactites and sending them plummeting into the lava. Her head hurt. She was thirsty. Once upon a time she’d carted corpses through this heat, hadn’t she? Back then she’d barely noticed the temperature. Rin didn’t have time to be nostalgic though, not while she had an objective.

She saw a figure up ahead, dancing through the heat haze. Black hair, black wings… it had to be Utsuho. She was safe at least. “Okuu!” Rin yelled, trying to catch her attention. “Okuu, what’s going on?”

Utsuho glanced in her direction, smiled, then continued dancing. Rin moved as fast as the heat would let her. As she got closer, she noticed odd things about Utsuho’s clothes. She was wearing a cape now, a huge white sheet that barely covered her wings. One of her shoes was covered in odd, grey rock, and her right arm now boasted a long, sleek cannon.

“Orin!” shouted Utsuho. “Look, look at this!” She pointed her cannon up at the ceiling. Rin instinctively ducked, but what shot out wasn’t a danmaku bullet, but a ball of flame the size of a melon. Rin couldn’t look at it directly, but she could sense it pulsating as it hovered above them. 

“I can make things like this now!” cried Utsuho. “All thanks to nuclear fusion!”

Rin didn’t like the sound of those words. “Nuclear fusion?”

“Yeah, someone from the surface came down and showed me how to use it! I don’t really understand it, but apparently it’s a godly, mythical energy source they can’t do in the outside world.”

“Someone from the surface? Who?”

“I don’t know her name, but she said she was a god.” Utsuho pointed her cannon back at the lava. “Watch, Orin! Watch me do it. It’s amazing!”

Rin backed up to the cave wall, nervous, and observed Utsuho from a slight distance. She could barely understand what was going on, honestly. Utsuho would shoot little balls of flame out of her cannon. The lava would roar, and fly up in little bursts. There’d be steam, noise, sometimes smoke, it was all very theatrical. But Utsuho looked delighted, like a child playing with a new toy. Rin hadn’t seen her look so happy in decades.

But, there was something fishy about it. This nuclear fusion thing seemed too strong, too convenient. There had to be a catch. When Utsuho was finally done, she turned back to Rin with a smile as bright as the sun, and said:

“Maybe now, we can finally show the surface who’s boss.”

There was a wicked look in her eyes. Her smile seemed too confident. Despite the extreme heat, Rin shivered.

If she didn’t do something, all hell would break loose.


End file.
